Although the actual extent remains unknown, it appears that recreational use of MDMA has increased dramatically during the last year. State and Federal crime labs have encountered MDMA throughout the country, and concern over increased use as well as possible adverse health affects led the Drug Enforcement Agency to emergency schedule MDMA as of July 1, 1985. Final scheduling is pending. With escalating use, we are also witnessing health and social psychological problems associated with MDMA. As yet, however, there is little systemically collected information about MDMA users and use patterns. Using a qualitative approach (and guided by the theoretical perspective of symbolic interactionism and the methodology of "grounded theroy") we intend to conduct a three-year exploratory study of MDMA users which will produce primarily descriptive data. We will complete 125 open-ended depth inteviews in the San Francisco Bay Area--cited by numerous media accounts as a major area of MDMA distribution and use. We will collect the following kinds of information from our respondents: 1) social histories; 2) health profiles; 3) drug and MDMA use history and patterns; 4) problems associated with MDMA use in particular and drug use in general; 5) user accounts of physiological and psychological effects of MDMA; 6) sociodemographics. In addition, we will address the improtant and timely issue of the effect of the recent scheduling on user attitude and comsumption patterns. The analysis of the above kinds of data will produce a more complete understanding of MDMA use and users. In this way, the foundations can be built for a larger, more representative surbey which might be completed at some future point. Furthermore, although MDMA use has not reached the epidemic proportions of heroin in the '70's or cocaine in the '80's, we will have the opportunity to develop a solid knowledge base before the onset of a potential crisis.